


Dallas

by andchimeras, thepurpleswitch (andchimeras)



Category: Sports Night
Genre: Backstory, F/M, Gen, Infidelity, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Therapy, married people who don't like each other very much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-12
Updated: 2014-11-12
Packaged: 2018-02-25 02:40:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2605574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andchimeras/pseuds/andchimeras, https://archiveofourown.org/users/andchimeras/pseuds/thepurpleswitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"What'd you do in Dallas?" A story about Casey trying--sometimes not very hard--and failing, a lot, with many different people, in several cities, over almost ten years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dallas

**Author's Note:**

  * For [phoebesmum](https://archiveofourown.org/users/phoebesmum/gifts).



> I started writing this in 2003, quit it in 2008, and then looked at it again on a whim last week and realized it was actually fine and very much worth posting properly. Luna (tangleofthorns) looked at it at some point in the first five years, and I thank her for that; probably she said it was fine at the time, but I had a Grand Design/Plan/Vision and could not be swayed. Anyway, this is for Hilary, who said it was a treasure.
> 
> Notes in re: infidelity and "married people who don't like each other very much" tags can be found at the end. And yes, Abby is The Worst Therapist In The History Of The World, Ever.

_Abby._  
  
It's wrong. It's easy, the way wrong things usually are: getting married, for instance, and Dallas, and turning down Late Night. Easy, but so totally wrong. It's wrong on many levels. He's still doing it.  
  
Abby smiles, and Casey knows instantly that this is not a therapy smile. This is a smile which, he would bet anything, Danny has never seen.  
  
She pushes him onto the bed with one hand, rucking up her skirt with the other, and Casey bets nothing that she's never ever straddled Danny like this, bets nothing because he doesn't need it confirmed, knows it's never happened, unless she's some sort of progressive -ian therapist with weird ideas about bodily intimacy and intimidation and. He's pretty sure Danny has no trouble with those things, he's pretty sure he ought to be thinking about the breasts in his face rather than the fact that.  
  
Well.  
  
He's about to have sex with Danny's therapist. And it's very, very wrong.  
  
Abby moves her hands to the buttons of his shirt. It's easy because he already knows he'll hate himself in the morning.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
Dana's new office is big, the second biggest in the suite. Smaller only than Sam's office, which is inhumanly, uselessly enormous. Dana's is tucked into a corner of their floor, airy and golden with a view of the Statue of Liberty so perfect it ought to be framed. It's calm, ordered. It's not Dana at all.  
  
She is bent over at her shiny chrome-and-glass desk, wearing sandy colours from her shoulders to the skirt that doesn't quite cover her knees. Her copper-polished toenails curl into the carpet.  
  
"You sent for me?"  
  
"I did," she says. "Sit down, Casey." Gesturing pointedly with her pen.  
  
"Okay." He sits.  
  
"Things are really good right now," Dana says. Casey doesn't quite know how to answer that and she looks up after a second, tortoiseshell glasses and her hair cut above her ears again. "Don't you think things are really good right now?"  
  
Slowly, Casey says, "Yes."  
  
Dana frowns. "I think they are."  
  
"I agreed with you."  
  
"You didn't mean it."  
  
"I did."  
  
She rolls her eyes and starts writing again, a wide silver watch thunking against the paper every time she jabs down a period. It looks suspiciously like one of Sam's new feedback memos. Casey hopes it's not for him. "You did not," she says.  
  
He spreads his hands. "How can I prove it to you?"  
  
"Tell Dan that things are really good right now."  
  
Dana must have been mumbling into the memo because Casey is certain she didn't say that. "Pardon me?"  
  
She looks up again. "Go to Dan and tell him things are really good right now."  
  
"I'm sure he knows."  
  
"That's nice, but I'm sure he knows no such thing. Casey, he's walking around here like the last nine months never happened. Like things never got better, like we're still on the brink of ruin. Which is _not_ good, because things _are_ really good right now."  
  
They are not on the brink of ruin, feels really good just to think it. And Dana's right. Danny's been quiet again lately, or too loud; he's chosen to be alone a lot. Casey has studiously let him be alone a lot. "Yeah."  
  
"I mean, we moved our entire organisation, we lost half our staff to this responsible production racket, Isaac retired, Sam 'Lothario' Donovan replaced him, we went through three months of production tune-ups with the new finance people, four months with the new marketing people, and look at us." She gestures behind him, through the glass of her office walls, and he obliges, swivelling his chair around.  
  
Subdued hive-like buzz of the new bullpen: Natalie standing beside Jeremy in front of the brightly-coloured schedule board, her hand in his back pocket; Will rushing toward the studio, followed by a gaggle of interns trailing paper and wire; the new research and analysis team, Alys, hunched at her computer outside Casey and Danny's office.  
  
"We're contenders, Casey," she says.  
  
He turns back to her, trying to get rid of his small smile. "That's what Sam's been saying."  
  
"It's true. We're contending."  
  
"And you want me to go tell Danny we're contending." She gives him a 'duh' expression and he continues, "Though I'm sure he already knows that since you say it three times a rundown, six times during the show, and Sam keeps sending out these memos re: contending."  
  
She glares at him for a moment before saying, "I want you to go convince Dan that things are really good. Everything. The show, you guys, me, everybody. Everything. All the things."  
  
"Are really good."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Right now."  
  
"Yes, Casey."  
  
"Because you weren't entirely clear about what I'm supposed to say."  
  
"Go away." But she smiles at him as he shrugs and leaves.  
  
He sees Danny around the corner, a block of dark colour standing over the fax machine looking very irritated. Casey passes him, walks quickly to editing.  
  
  
  
 _Abby._  
  
After, Abby puts on a blue nightshirt and throws him his boxers. She goes into the adjacent bathroom and he hears her brushing her teeth, flossing. As he dresses he thinks he should get into a dental hygiene regimen again, should buy a new electric toothbrush and maybe one of those Waterpik things for getting rid of hidden cavity-causing agents between the teeth, invest in a home whitening system.  
  
Abby leans in the doorway, light behind her, making her into this amorphous black shape with crossed arms and feet.  
  
"So," she says. It's a cool tone. Almost businesslike. Danny's probably heard this one.  
  
"So?" he asks, pushing his arm through the sleeve of his undershirt.  
  
She leans into the bedroom, tugs the pull under a lamp on her bedside table. He blinks as she steps a few feet closer. She smooths her nightshirt over her thighs and sits on the bed. Arms crossed again, legs crossed at the ankle.  
  
"So," she says again, slowly, like he should know exactly what she's talking about and should have already given her a thorough and satisfactory response. "What'd you do in Dallas?"  
  
What did he do in Dallas.  
  
Abby watches him. It could be considered a stare, but there's no pressure in her eyes, just observation. She's watching him, and it's not the most comfortable thing in the world. Especially since they just. Well. Had sex. And now she's watching him like he's some sort of--  
  
Patient.  
  
Goddammit.  
  
He buckles his belt and says, "Why do you ask?"  
  
Abby passes him his shirt. "You mentioned having a bad time in Dallas, I thought you might want to talk about it."  
  
"I met with you to talk about Dan," he says, pulling the sweater up his arms before ducking his head through the collar. What he did in Dallas.  
  
She cocks her head. "You're allowed to have problems too, you know."  
  
Casey considers sitting down to tie his shoes, and then remembers he's wearing loafers. "I really don't have any problems," he says.  
  
"It's okay to feel uncomfortable talking about it with me, considering," she says, cocking her head. "And considering how we met and who I am in Dan's life."  
  
A few seconds pass. Abby is giving him this look, it might be expectant, and he's glad he didn't sit down. "I'm really fine," he says.  
  
She shrugs. "Okay, fine. You just mentioned that you'd had a hard time in Dallas and I thought you might want to talk about it." She looks around the room. "Got everything?" she asks.  
  
"Yeah," he says.  
  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
After the Friday night show Casey makes Danny stay to watch the last half-hour of a fifteen-thousand meter race in Beijing. Casey is a man on a mission. The gospel of Dana, the gospel of really good things. He needs to know, and Danny needs to know too.  
  
"I didn't know distance running was big in China," Danny says.  
  
"It's not." Casey mutes the flat English translation of the commentary.  
  
Danny drinks his beer, sitting quietly at the other end of the couch, one leg drawn up beside him.  
  
"Things are really good right now," Casey says.  
  
Dropping his foot to the floor, Danny makes a face, says nothing for a moment. Then, "What is it you want to say to me, Casey."  
  
"Just that. Things are really good right now." Tell me they're not, Danny, tell me why they're not.  
  
"No." Danny shakes his head, turning the bottle in his hands. "That's what Dana wants you to say to me. I'm asking: what do you, Casey, want to say to me."  
  
What's wrong. I know it's my fault. Just tell me. "How. Um. How are you feeling?"  
  
Another odd expression, part annoyed, part something else. Could be anger, could be sadness, could be a lot of things. "Feeling fine," he says, the lightness in his voice dropping like two tons of concrete. He takes another drink.  
  
"Danny, you're not fooling anyone. You do a really lousy job of acting fine. Always have."  
  
Danny looks away, deliberately, out into the dark newsroom. "I'll try harder, okay."  
  
What the hell? "No, Danny, no. Not okay." Jesus. "You need to actually _be_ fine. That would be okay."  
  
"I can't just _be_ fine, Casey. Fine is not as easy as it sounds."  
  
Intellectually, Casey knows this. He's having a bit of a hard time with the reality. "Abby--"  
  
Danny snorts. "Abby helps. When she's not making it worse. Which is most of the time."  
  
"Going to get worse before it gets better," Casey says, thinking about when he and Lisa were in counselling-- _mediation_ , she insisted on calling it, like they were negotiating a contract, hoping to settle a strike. He tries not to think about how spectacularly that maxim failed.  
  
"It's been over a year." Danny's voice is weary and petulant. "I'm tired of this."  
  
"It is getting better, though." And as he says it, Casey realises it's true. "I mean, we're sitting here."  
  
Danny flinches a little. "Yeah."  
  
"Just. I don't even know what's going on, and that makes it hard for me to tell Dana you'll be okay, that she shouldn't worry about it." Makes me feel useless, angry, stupid, blind.  
  
"You don't need to tell Dana I'll be okay. I'm perfectly capable of doing that myself."  
  
"Then you should."  
  
"Tell her?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
Bitter chuckle. "I don't think so."  
  
Why. "Why not?"  
  
"Casey, come on. Would you really want to go to your boss, not to mention your best friend, these incredible people who you've known for years, and tell them your therapist says you're severely depressed but you're seeing afore-mentioned therapist regularly and they need to back the hell off and leave you alone?"  
  
Whom, Casey thinks. Whom I have known.  
  
Depressed.  
  
"Depression?"  
  
Danny shrugs, taking a drink. "Yeah," he says.  
  
"Like, the condition?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Because there's also the emotion, and one can feel the latter without necessarily suffering from the former."  
  
"It's the former."  
  
"The condition."  
  
"Yes, Casey. The condition."  
  
"You're suffering from depression."  
  
"On the contrary." Danny sets his beer on their coffee table a little harder than necessary and stands. "I'm having a grand old time with depression. It gets me into such fun and interesting situations."  
  
Like what they're doing right now. "Danny--"  
  
"Casey. Back off. Really."  
  
Danny takes his coat from the hook on the back of their office door and shrugs it on. "You want a ride?" he asks. Casey can tell he's just being polite.  
  
Casey shakes his head. "No. Thanks, Dan."  
  
Danny stands very still at the open door and looks at him for a minute. Then he goes.  
  
Back the hell off and leave him alone. That's it, Casey thinks as the fifteen-thousand meter race drags on into its final lap, that's all I can do. I'm going to have to talk to somebody about this.  
  


 

_Dallas._  
  
Casey will remember what he was wearing, too. Brownish-kinda suit with a striped greenish tie. Lisa picked it out, petulant, obviously not caring that it made him look like an overgrown Keebler elf, probably hoping it would make him think of the wardrobe consultants he would have had at Late Night. Bullshit, he knew, but Lisa'd never been overly concerned with reality. Only. Only appearances.  
  
He won't remember what Danny's wearing because he didn't really look at Danny at any point during the day, especially after they'd changed, after they'd sat at the shiny-slick desk. He'd been trying to concentrate on the startling realisation that he gave up his own network show to take this cheap excuse for a regional update. It hit him, being in the Lone Star offices, the studio.  
  
He looked at the script in his hands, squinted at the teleprompter, kicked his legs out a little bit under the desk, just to make sure he wouldn't hit his knees or shins on anything during the show.  
  
"You smell that?" Danny said, looking over the studio like it was a small, treasured slice of his kingdom.  
  
Casey sniffed, knowing he was supposed to be the serious one. "What should I be smelling, Danny? The make-up, the crappy coffee, the stale deli tray, what?"  
  
Danny nodded his head, smiling, smiling. "All that, yes, Casey."  
  
"And whatever the hell this desk is covered in."  
  
"Varnish."  
  
"It's still wet?" He lifted his arms away from the cherry wood, looking for spots on his jacket sleeves.  
  
"No, it just smells like varnish. I'm speaking of the metaphysical, Casey. It's the smell of progress. Change, transition. A miasma, if you will. Of moving forward."  
  
Casey watched Danny's hands as he made a moving-forward gesture, pencil caught between the middle and ring fingers of his left hand. "Progress smells like Bob Villa's bathroom?"  
  
Danny would have none of it. "That was a truly horrible pop culture reference, and no. It's the future, Casey. It's our future."  
  
"Okay, guys," Dana said in his ear and he looked up, through the glass window of the booth, watching her lean over her mike. "We're good to go, we've got all sorts of green lights, we're going to have a good show."  
  
"You smelling the future in there, Dana?" Danny asked.  
  
"I'm smelling Richard's aftershave and, I think, possibly yours. You bathe in that stuff, Danny?"  
  
Danny sat back, quelled for a split second. "I'm happy, I'm a happy guy tonight," he said defensively. "And you killjoys aren't going to make me not happy. Because, see, the future--"  
  
"You're smelling it," Dana said.  
  
"Indeed I am," Danny said.  
  
"You're a freak, Danny," Dana said, Casey could hear her smiling too, could see it as she raised her eyes to look at them.  
  
"Indeed I am."  
  
Dana laughed. It was a good sound, through the earpiece, a good sound. "We're going to do it just like the dry run, guys, and we're going to have a _good show_."  
  
"Indeed we are," Casey said, finally looking over at Danny.  
  
He won't remember what Danny's wearing, but he'll remember his face, his eyes, they were so bright they seemed golden. He'll measure Danny's future smiles against this moment, and he'll never see Danny quite this happy again.  
  
Casey smiled back, utterly helpless.

  
  
  
_New York._  
  
It had taken them six weeks to find a new bar after they were adopted into the Quo Vadimus building in July. One night, walking to the subway after the show, Casey and Dana had passed a place called the Den Green, a sign in the dark-tinted window promising seventy-six inches of sharp, high definition sports coverage from noon until four in the morning.  
  
In January, Casey sits across from Jeremy and Natalie in their accustomed booth. Dana's on a date with a guy named Chet and Casey doesn't care. "Dan needed some sleep," he tells Natalie without being asked and he could be right, for all he knows. Danny didn't even speak to him after the show.  
  
"Okay," Natalie says. She sips from her beer and tries to see the big screen television behind Casey.  
  
Jeremy folds his hands around his own bottle, then re-folds them. "He's been looking tired lately."  
  
"Yeah," Casey says. "We've all been working really hard."  
  
"Shut up," Natalie says sharply. "Pete's about to break Andre's serve."  
  
Jeremy leans over the table and says quietly to Casey, "Is there anything--"  
  
"He's fine," Casey says.  
  
Jeremy looks sceptical. More sceptical than usual. "On Friday he busted a pair of headphones when Murray stopped tape before the end of the tease was recorded," he says.  
  
Casey's glass is empty. He doesn't usually drink bourbon. He runs his thumb around the edge of the glass; slightly sticky, mostly dry. "I didn't know about that," he says, a little defensive. Nobody'd told him.  
  
"I didn't think you did," Jeremy says gently. "I'm just saying, Casey--"  
  
"Shut it!" Natalie slaps Jeremy's arm with the back of her hand. "Pete's kicking Andre's ass. And a fine ass it is."  
  
Jeremy sighs. "I thought you weren't going to ogle male tennis players anymore."  
  
"But I can still ogle the girls, right?" She smiles, wide and low, eyes glittering.  
  
"Um," Jeremy says.  
  
"I'm going to get another drink," Casey says, and he leaves the table.  
  
At the bar he pays their evening's tab thus far and adds an extra six for Natalie's forthcoming pina colada.  
  
He catches a cab and gets out six blocks before his building. He stops at the corner and looks right. If he turns here, he'll be at Danny's in ten minutes. He can see the fluorescent sign outside the cigar shop next to Danny's building. The light changes, the walk sign turns white, and he crosses the street. Six blocks of early-winter chill, headlights in his eyes.  
  
He wouldn't know what to say if he went. He'd say the wrong thing. Danny would glare at him, probably yell. He wouldn't know if Danny was actually pissed at Casey, or at himself. He wouldn't be able to tell if it was something completely different, something of which Casey has no idea.  
  
He unlocks his apartment door and doesn't turn on any lights as he shuts it again, locks it again. He leaves his bedroom door open and sits on the edge of the bed.  
  
He knows there are things he's better off not knowing; he's well aware that Danny is capable of deciding what Casey does and does not need to know, but he doesn't want that--the thing that happened before, Danny's sudden strangeness and Casey's defensive anger--he doesn't want it to happen again. He really doesn't want to watch it coming, either.  
  
He just doesn't know how to stop it.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
Lisa smoothed her blonde hair back into a ponytail on Saturday morning. Casey stood over the couch, watching Charlie doze between cartoons.  
  
"One good thing about Texas," Lisa said, her voice cheerful and strained, "is that you can go to barbecues in February."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
They'd fought about it the night before. Lisa had complained about the heat and the dust. 'Do you want Charlie to get asthma?' she had yelled. 'Of course not,' he'd said, of course not, but it's Danny's birthday and. 'Jesus, Lisa,' he'd said. 'It's Danny's birthday.'  
  
As if that ought to immediately convince her. As if Danny wasn't the reason they were in Texas at all. Not that he is, Casey thought as Lisa sat Charlie up and started putting his little red sneakers on his little Barney-socked feet. Lisa thought he was. But he wasn't.  
  
"Well," Lisa said, Charlie on her hip. He rubbed a little fist in his right eye. He probably didn't sleep well through the yelling last night, but he never made a sound. "We off, Case?"  
  
"Yeah," Casey said. "Yeah. I'll get the TV and the stuff."  
  
Lisa nodded quickly at him and picked up Charlie's little backpack on her way out the door--why a three-year-old would need a backpack he'll never figure. Casey heard her say, "It's Dan's birthday, Charlie, hey, it's Dan's birthday," in her bright Mommy-is-excited-so-let's-get-happy voice.  
  
Casey grabbed the wrapped copy of _On the Waterfront_ and his car keys from the counter. He hit the power button on the TV set on his way past.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
Abby said she would meet him at Anthony's on Saturday night, said she would be wearing a red shirt and that she has brown hair. There is a woman sitting at the bar, she fits the description. Casey thinks he vaguely remembers seeing her here before, a few times, talking with Danny.  
  
He stifles the impulse to take a deep breath and walks up to her, leans on the bar beside her. "Abby?" he says.  
  
She turns, arms crossed on the countertop. She smiles. "Abby Jacobs. It's nice to meet you, Casey." She sticks a hand out and he shakes it.  
  
He says, "Pleasure's mine."  
  
The bartender comes past, some tall thin red-haired girl Casey's never seen before, and he orders a Bud. He's not sure what he should say next.  
  
Abby says, "If you called me to talk about Dan, you're wasting your time. Doctor-patient confidentiality."  
  
Looking over at her, her smile has disappeared. "Why else would I call you?"  
  
A little smirk. This woman goes through facial expressions like most people go through socks. "Because he told you I'm a babe?"  
  
His beer is placed before him and he takes a drink, considering his response. It was obviously a joke, but she is, and Danny did tell him that exact thing. He shrugs. "He mentioned something like that, yes."  
  
Really smiling again, she empties her glass.  
  
If she's not allowed to talk to him about Danny, he's not entirely sure what to do now. He could say thanks anyway, it was nice to meet you. He could say so let's talk about my friend…Stan instead. He could say indeed you are a babe, may I buy you a drink?  
  
"Would you like another?" he says.  
  
She gives him a long, unreadable look. Then she ducks her head, nodding, says, "Yeah, I would," another smile.  
  
He can't stop himself from taking a deep breath as he gestures to the red-haired girl.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
It wasn't that dusty or that hot in Danny's small, almost-crowded backyard. Charlie had sunscreen slicked over his nose, though, and his cheeks. Menacingly dark grey smoke puffed up from the grill. Danny stood over it, looking bemused, wearing a starch-stiff white apron with the iron-on command: Kiss Me, I'm Texan.  
  
"How's it coming?" Casey asked.  
  
"Honestly, I haven't the foggiest." The hand Danny waved ineffectually through the smoke was filled with a beer bottle.  
  
"Pizza would have been acceptable, Dan. Or even Tex-Mex. At, you know, a restaurant. Where they cook your food for you."  
  
"I'm trying to acclimate."  
  
"You're from New York."  
  
"I'm from Connecticut."  
  
"Which is, in fact, farther from Texas than New York. If you acclimated, you'd evaporate."  
  
Danny glared at him during a brief lull in the smokescreen. "Answer me this, Casey. Whose birthday is it?"  
  
"Yours, Danny."  
  
"Damn straight."  
  
"Christmas in February."  
  
"Amen, my friend."  
  
"Twenty-five A.D."  
  
"That's Anno Dan, right?"  
  
"Anno Danny. Yes."  
  
"Dan."  
  
"No, I'm Casey. _You're_ Danny, and it's your birthday. So?"  
  
"So shut up and hand me that bottle of red stuff."  
  
"I believe the natives call it bar. Beh. Cue. Sauce."  
  
"Ha ha. Give it here, Chuckles."  
  
Casey did, then looked around for Charlie and Lisa. Lisa stood near the fence, glass of white wine in hand, chatting with the station manager's wife--Rhonda from New Jersey, the only person even remotely connected to Casey's job whom Lisa could stand. Charlie sat at Lisa's feet, running a little car up and down his legs.  
  
"Dang," Danny said. "Bottle's empty." Casey shook his head, that's too bad. "Oh. Karen's here," Danny added. "In the kitchen."  
  
"What's she doing in your kitchen?"  
  
Danny shrugged. "Salad or something. How the hell should I know?"  
  
"She's making sandwiches, isn't she?"  
  
"None of your business."  
  
"I hope she brought turkey. I love a turkey sandwich in February."  
  
"Go away now."  
  
Casey wandered away, a little tired of bugging Danny, a little tired of the whole thing. I'm not in the mood, he thought, not in the mood for Danny's party, Danny's ineptitude, Lisa's boredom. He avoided people from work, tried to ignore the raucous laughter of Danny's other friends as they gathered round the grill, clapping Danny on the back and giving him useless advice. Kids, Casey found himself thinking, though they were probably not more than five or six years younger than himself. Danny's age. And suddenly he was standing at the half-open sliding patio doors of Danny's townhouse.  
  
He walked in, looking over at the kitchen. Karen stood at the counter wearing a lemon yellow dress with short sleeves and a sweetheart neckline. Honey-coloured hair settled gently on her shoulders; he tried to think what shade of blond Lisa's hair was. She set a sliced sandwich on a plate of probably a dozen sandwiches. All white bread, Casey noted, Lisa would be annoyed--Lisa was almost always annoyed.  
  
Karen looked over, smiling brightly. "Hey, Casey."  
  
"Hey. You make any turkey?"  
  
She laughed. "Of course. I know how you love a turkey sandwich in February."  
  
He knew she knew, and that was odd, because she had only been at Lone Star for six months, she'd only replaced Dana the August before. And Dana--Dana whom he had known for nearly ten years--had no clue that he loved a turkey sandwich in February. Dana, who was in LA--PacifiCast all over her when their coverage of the previous Cowboys season received a Western Broadcast News Producers' Association award for best regional sports program.  
  
Lisa was in the backyard, pretending to be the wife of Late Night with Casey McCall. And Karen. Karen slid a sandwich on a star-spangled paper plate down the counter.  
  
"Turkey a la Willis," she said.  
  
"Sounds delicious," he said. Smiling back.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
Casey doesn't really understand why it's so easy to lean across the bar and talk to Abby--intellectually he knows it's because that's her _job_ , but he doesn't do this. Talk to people in bars, that is.  
  
"--and the pole snapped!" she says, miming the breakage with a plastic swizzle stick. Casey laughs.  
  
"I can't believe you were in track," he says.  
  
"Field," she corrects, poking in his direction with one end of the stick.  
  
Casey nods, thinking of Danny's theory that track and field is just all the crappy bits left over from other sports. "Right. Field. You just don't look the type."  
  
"You haven't seen my thighs," she says and he knows, all of a sudden, what Jeremy means when he says "took it to the next level."  
  
He looks at her as she smiles at him, a low, muted smile and then she flicks her fingers and looks for the bartender.  
  
"I'll have another," she says to the redhead. "Put it on his tab."  
  
The bartender moves her head, as if she's laughing on the inside, and takes Abby's glass.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
"We're going to Houston," Danny said, throwing a baseball at Casey.  
  
Casey caught it. "We are going to Houston."  
  
"We're going to Houston, baby!"  
  
Casey smiled, palming the ball until it was warm, flicking it up and down in the air. Danny hopped around the office, chanting _we're going to Houston_ at varying speeds and volumes, probably trying to do it in accents as well. Casey watched and wondered why he wasn't nearly that excited.  
  
"Casey," Danny said, stopping suddenly.  
  
"Dan."  
  
"What are you doing after the show on Friday?"  
  
"I think I'm going to Houston." Casey tossed the baseball back across the office. Danny caught it, turned it instinctively to a split-finger fastball.  
  
"What a coincidence," he said. "Me too."  
  
"A coincidence indeed," Casey said.  
  
Danny moved the ball between his hands, somehow different from the way Casey just tossed it--something different.  
  
"My boys, my boys," Karen said from the doorway. "Lone Star is going to Houston."  
  
Danny held his arms open toward her. "And here stands the woman of the hour! The delectable doyenne of Darlington who holds open the gates of--"  
  
"We're going to Houston," Karen said, not even looking at Danny. "To cover the strike."  
  
"Yeah," Danny said. He sounded surprised and lost; really, he had for the last month. The strike was lasting way too long.  
  
Karen smiled, widely. She smiled at Casey and he smiled back.  
  
Eyes closed, Danny coiled up, miming a pitch.  
  
"We're staying the weekend?" Casey asked.  
  
"Do you think we need to?" she asked. It was a little more than her words. She was asking if he was going to make a move while they were covering the Astros. The lack of the Astros. The lack of baseball.  
  
Danny took up a batting stance. Eyes still closed, baseball still clutched in his hand.  
  
That morning Lisa had said she's pretty sure he's going to fuck things up in Houston. No reason she shouldn't be right. No reason.  
  
Danny swung, and from the twist of his arms on the follow-through, Casey knew it was a strike.  
  
"Actually," Casey said. "Yeah."  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
"Do you think I should whiten my teeth?" he asks Danny on Monday morning.  
  
Danny stops in the office doorway, jacket hanging from one arm, pauses for a second. "Good morning, Casey," he says. He comes in, tossing his coat on the couch.  
  
"Good morning, Dan. Do you think I should whiten my teeth?" This is good, this is going very well for the Monday After Abby.  
  
Flipping through his mail, Danny muses, "It's remarkable how you're so completely concerned with your appearance when it's incredibly obvious to the rest of us that you don't need any improvements."  
  
"I don't?" The question is an anti-personnel mine, he realises as soon as he lays it, buries it. He hopes Danny doesn't take the wrong step.  
  
Danny looks up, it's hard to meet his eyes, and he says very seriously, "No, Casey. You really don't." He goes back to his mail.  
  
Casey thinks about that, figures he must need some improvements or he wouldn't have slept with Abby, and he wouldn't have told her about Dallas--he wouldn't have mentioned Dallas at the bar--he wouldn't have called Abby--he wouldn't have copied Abby's number from Danny's phonebook. He must need improving or Dallas wouldn't have happened in the first place.  
  
He takes the card from his pocket and taps it on his desk, slides it under the corner of his phone, face-down. Just something to think about, Abby had said.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
Danny will ask Casey if Lone Star was the beginning of the end for him and Lisa and Casey will say yes. Danny will get a pleased, vindicated, guilty look on his face and Casey will not regret lying.  
  
Before that, though, he stood in his kitchen looking at Lisa sitting on the stairs. She wore jeans and her Sgt. Pepper T-shirt. Her feet were bare and Casey thought of licking them in bed, running his tongue around her toes.  
  
His mouth felt dirty. He could taste Karen's lipstick. Could smell the tartness of her perfume. The cool linen of her dress under his hands.  
  
"How was Houston?" Lisa asked, arms crossed over her stomach. She looked tired, and Casey wondered if that was new and if not, why he'd never noticed it before.  
  
He dropped his suitcase down by the breakfast table. "Good."  
  
"The interviews were good," she said, as if it were a given.  
  
"Yes." The taste in his mouth grew, sticky and dark like black licorice. "Is there any coffee?"  
  
Lisa jumped up and came down the stairs. "No, sorry. I'll make some."  
  
"It's okay," he said. "I'll just have a glass of water." He didn't really want coffee. He wanted to be stripped down and have all his parts replaced, because he didn't think he could let Lisa touch him as he was. Grease and thick oil caked in his creases, he felt so slick and dirty.  
  
She stopped on the other side of the table, resting her clean pale hands on the back of a spindly wrought iron chair, too mod for Dallas. She swallowed and she'd been crying, he could see the familiar red blotches on her neck. His own throat creaked. "I didn't mean it," she said, her voice thick.  
  
Casey took a step back, towards the door. "Didn't mean what?"  
  
"When I said--about Karen," she made a sound, half-sob, half-cough that came out like a sad laugh. "When I said you should just. Casey. You know what I'm talking about."  
  
He did, and he couldn't keep his voice from being cold. "When you said I should just fuck her."  
  
All of a sudden her face was covered in tears. "Yes. I didn't mean it."  
  
"I know." He felt ground to a halt, unable. Unable to move, to do anything but take her pain.  
  
"But you did," she said. She leaned to the side, half-crumbling. She pressed a hand to her chest, as if to stifle herself.  
  
He didn't. Almost. He was going to, he would have. But he couldn't, there wasn't time, Danny was always right around the corner. Just a very long, very sweaty kiss, bitter with Karen's oily lipstick, and then Danny busting in, waving a cocktail napkin with somebody's phone number scrawled on it. Casey shrugged. Pain in his shoulders; he wanted to reach for Lisa badly.  
  
She turned ugly, her face twisted, her hands curling into fists. "Fuck, Casey," she said.  
  
Nothing, nothing to say. It didn't matter what he said. He was going to fuck Karen. He wanted to fuck Karen. It doesn't matter that he didn't actually do it. It was a crime of missed opportunity.  
  
"Well," Lisa said a long while later, her voice brittle. "At least you're man enough to fuck around on me."  
  
He should have expected that. After ten years one would think he'd be expecting that. "I'm going to bed," he said. He wanted to beg her forebearance.  
  
He picked up his suitcase and was on his way to the stairs, retreating, when she said, "You wanted water."  
  
Lisa took a glass from the rack beside the sink. Casey said, "I don't really--"  
  
He wanted to beg her patience. He wanted to explain the streaked window inside of him, his inability to see how much he could hurt until it was done. He wanted to tell her he was not a man. He was scared, and tired. He felt like a child; clamouring for superficial freedom and terrified when it presented itself.  
  
"Lisa," he said instead, low and sorry.  
  
The glass was full of water and she turned, the dark blue cradled in her hands. She looked up at him standing across the room, foot on the bottom stair. Her chest heaved, her eyes and her mouth tragic. She shook her head. "Just go upstairs."  
  
He did.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
"This is a funny thing," Danny says when he comes back from seeing Abby on Thursday.  
  
Casey looks up, doesn't have time to even open his mouth before Danny keeps talking.  
  
"Usually," he says, "usually I walk into Abby's office and she says 'how are you, Danny?' To which I say I'm fine, thanks for asking. Then she says 'that's good, now tell me how you're really doing.' At this point I either laugh and start talking or start crying and talk later. But, see, that didn't happen tonight."  
  
What happened instead? is formed clearly in Casey's mind, he swallows and starts to speak, but then.  
  
"No, Casey, that's not what happened. This. Is what happened. I walked in. She said, 'how are you, Danny?' I said I'm fine, thanks, and you? She said 'I'm good, thanks for asking,' and--get this, man, this is the funny part." He stops to force a short laugh. "She said, 'how's Casey?'"  
  
He's standing in front of the desk, hands spread out at his sides, kind of grinning but it's weird and angry and confused at the same time.  
  
"How about that," Casey says, and immediately blinks because it's bar-none the stupidest thing he's ever said.  
  
Danny nods, wide-eyed, shoving his hands in his jacket pockets. "How about that." He stares for a minute, face hardening. Then he turns away, shrugging off his coat, saying lightly, "How about that Stars/Kings game."  
  
Looking down quickly, swallowing, Casey reads from his legal pad, "For the third time this season, the Los Angeles Kings have been crowned in the sprawling metropolis of Dallas, at the newly repainted American Airlines Center. Cue tape, blah blah blah highlights. This win moves the Kings into fourth place in the Western Conference, just two points behind the third-ranked Colorado Avalanche, who will be crashing into the Staples Center next month during a two-week roadtrip."  
  
At the laptop, Danny says, "The first period isn't even over."  
  
"I'm calling it early."  
  
"Nobody's scored. The first period is, like, five minutes in."  
  
"I'm making a call. The call is made." Five minutes old, they've only been playing for five minutes. That sentence could have been better. Casey wants to know what Danny said when Abby asked after him.  
  
"So I should write the contingency script? In case those classes with Miss Cleo aren't coming along as quickly as you'd like?"  
  
Casey meets Danny's eyes across the office and feels his stomach cringe when Danny tries to smirk at him.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
For ten days they didn't speak. Lisa didn't put his cereal bowl and coffee cup out in the morning, there was no plate of dinner for him in the fridge. She was asleep when he got home, the bedroom door locked, the TV signing off some other station's eleven o'clock news.  
  
Lisa wasn't interested in his apologies, his pleas, or his muddled explanations, and Casey didn't blame her. They were weak excuses, useless coverings for this latest fuck-up, and when Karen was fired, he was glad--to see her red eyes over her box of personal items, to turn away from her when she tried to say goodbye-- _glad_.  
  
"She's gone," he said to Lisa. "Nothing happened," a lie, a lie, but worth it, he thought, "nothing was going to happen, but she's gone."  
  
Lisa turned red-rimmed eyes toward him for the first time in a week. "Why did she go?"  
  
He shrugged. "She's not a very good producer. Richard fired her."  
  
Lisa did not nod or smile or say anything. She blinked coldly at him and turned away.  
  
Dana returned a few days later. Two days, during which Richard had made frantic phone calls to LA, had said 'Dana'll be here on Thursday' while running production meetings, voice high and profound, as if he were announcing the Second Coming.  
  
"I missed you so much," she said to Danny, hugging him tightly in the newsroom. She distributed cheesy souvenir T-shirts to their team, showed off the little butterfly tattoo fluttering greenly on her hip.  
  
"I love California," she said, fingers flickering over a mysterious bandage on her neck. "But it doesn't love me."  
  
As the party moved out of the station, into cars headed for the Buckaroo, Dana's favourite bar, she caught Casey's arm.  
  
"I missed you too." She grimaced. "A lot."  
  
He brushed the bandage, accidentally touching her skin, flinching back. "Me too."  
  
  
  
 _Abby._  
  
"This was, what, 1993?" Abby asks. She's sitting with her legs crossed with one of those coffee shop chairs that looks far more comfortable than it actually is. Casey tries to look confused and she rolls her eyes at him. "Dallas."  
  
"Yeah," Casey says. "We went on the air in '93, we really got rolling in '94."  
  
"Big time in sports."  
  
Casey shrugs. It couldn't have been big, or everything that happened was big. Nothing that happened in Dallas was big. "Not for a regional update in Texas."  
  
Abby frowns. "Danny told me you guys covered the strike heavily."  
  
"We did."  
  
"So it was a big time. A big time leading to _the_ big time."  
  
"We covered it, but not very well." He can see the 'why' surfacing in her face--sometimes she is incredibly easy to read. He wonders why Danny complains about her stoicness so much. Casey gives his stock excuse. "Our producer was inexperienced."  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Yeah. So it wasn't anything like the big time. CSC didn't contact us until ninety-six."  
  
"What kind of time was it, then? Small time?"

 

_Dallas._  
  
"Lisa's pissed at you, isn't she?" Danny asked on Friday during the VTR.  
  
Casey put on a confused face. "I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about."  
  
Danny said, "Dude, you've been wearing the same tie all week."  
  
"Really?" Casey looked down at it. He hadn't noticed.  
  
"Yeah." Danny rolled his chair closer, speaking quietly. "You need to talk to her."  
  
"Danny--"  
  
"Seriously. You're a mess, Casey. I don't know what you did, and if you wanted me to know you'd have told me by now--"  
  
"I would not," Casey said.  
  
"-- _or_. Or you would have sent out signals indicating to me that you wanted me to convince you to tell me--"  
  
"Very nice, Danny, lovely pronouns."  
  
"One would be hard-pressed to identify you as a professional writer," Dana remarked into her mike.  
  
Danny pointed at the booth. "Nobody's talking to you."  
  
"Thirty seconds," Dana said with a grin and Casey smiled what he hoped was a passable smile.  
  
Danny turned back to Casey. "I'm just saying, if you _wanted_ me to know, I would know by now, so I'm not going to ask."  
  
"Thank you."  
  
"However, you need to explain yourself, apologise to her, grovel, brainwash, I don't care--"  
  
"I'll talk to her."  
  
"Good. Also. May I just note. It's sad when a grown man with an important job can't pick out a clean tie in the morning. Or even, you know, notice when he has failed to do so."  
  
"Fuck off, Dan."  
  
"Ten seconds live," Dana said. "Wrap it up, Danny."  
  
Danny glared at the booth. "Fully wrapped."  
  
"Thank god," Dana and Casey said together.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
After the Friday night show, Casey is changing back into his street clothes when Danny comes into their office and closes the door, already out of his suit.  
  
"The bad thing about responsible production," Casey says, "is having to provide and maintain our own on-air--"  
  
"Yeah," Danny interrupts, sounding distracted. "Hey, Casey."  
  
"Yes, Dan?"  
  
"Who's Nora White?"  
  
Casey stops in the middle of tying his left shoe. "Nora White," he says.  
  
Danny nods. "Nora White, D. P-S-Y."  
  
"Sounds like a psychiatrist," Casey says.  
  
"Yeah, she does," Danny says. He leans against the door, arms crossed. "In fact, she is a psychiatrist. Her card was on your desk."  
  
"Really?"  
  
"Yes. And her office called this afternoon, while you were in editing."  
  
"Really."  
  
"Yes. To confirm your appointment on Tuesday morning."  
  
"How about that."  
  
"Yes."  
  
Casey stands and picks up his laptop case from beside his desk. He walks toward the door, stopping when Danny doesn't get out of his way. "Danny."  
  
"Casey, come on."  
  
"Where?"  
  
Danny makes his frustrated face. "Why didn't you tell me you're seeing a shrink?"  
  
"I'm not."  
  
"And yet you have an appointment with one on Tuesday morning. What, is she going to advise you on your draft picks?"  
  
"I haven't," Casey takes a deep breath. "I haven't actually gone to. See her. As of, you know, yet."  
  
"So, technically, you're not seeing her."  
  
"Yes." They stand in front of the door for a moment, Danny nodding and looking into the distance. Casey says, "So, if you could step out of the way."  
  
"Why didn't you tell me?"  
  
"It's not something I...felt a need to tell you."  
  
"I told you about Abby."  
  
"That's what you do."  
  
Danny's eyes narrow, he steps away from the door. "And what the hell does that mean?"  
  
Casey steps away from Danny. "You tell me everything."  
  
"I do not."  
  
"You do. You tell me everything, and I don't do that."  
  
"This is probably why you need to see a psychiatrist."  
  
"What?"  
  
"You're totally repressed, Casey. You don't ever talk about anything, and it's incredibly frustrating."  
  
"You." Casey shakes his head and decides to take the high road. "I'm not having this conversation, and in the future I'd appreciate it if you didn't snoop around my desk." And if that isn't hypocritical. "Now, please, Dan. I have Charlie this weekend, and I need some sleep."  
  
"By all means." Danny steps out of the way, he even holds the door open for Casey. He follows as Casey crosses the lobby towards the elevators, but he takes the stairs.  
  
Repressed? Is that really what Danny thinks? Danny--shouldn't think that. There are a lot of things he could talk about, things Danny doesn't want to hear, things Casey can't bear to have him hear, things Casey has done, that _happened_ , shouldn't have happened--  
  
Wouldn't have happened. But Casey loves to screw things up. He cannot escape himself.  
  
  
  
 _Abby._  
  
"It was a crazy time," Casey says. She just keeps watching him. Her hands are so still, folded loosely in her lap. Serene. He thinks of how still Danny has been the last year, a different kind of stillness, not serene at all. "A really crazy time."  
  
"Well, yeah," Abby says. "No baseball." She spreads her calm hands. Obviously, her hands say. Obviously things were crazy.  
  
Casey almost smiles. "Danny kept saying it was like his internal clock was busted. Like he could never really get into the seasonal rhythm again."  
  
"What was it like for you?"  
  
Casey looks over his shoulder at the crowded coffee shop, then down at his watch. It's eleven-thirty. "I should probably--"  
  
"Casey."  
  
He closes his eyes, her voice is so gentle. Why is she like this? Why does she have to make it so easy? So, so, so hard. "What."  
  
"How did you feel during the strike?"  
  
"I don't know," he says. He shrugs. "Crazy, I guess."  
  
"Crazy stupid?" she asks. "Crazy fun? Crazy crazy? There are lots of different kinds of crazy, Casey."  
  
An unfortunate rhyme. "Just. Crazy. Why are we doing this?"  
  
"I thought you might want to talk about it."  
  
"I want to leave," he says, "I'm trying to be polite."  
  
Abby leans across the table, pretty close. "You can leave any time you want. In fact, you didn't have to come up here at all." She pokes his shoulder. "But you won't feel better if you leave now. And the cappuccino you ordered is really, really good, if you care to try it."  
  
Jesus, Casey thinks. "I cheated on my wife, okay."  
  
Abby shrugs. "Okay."  
  
"Okay?"  
  
"What? You think I haven't heard that before?"  
  
He hadn't thought that, but now he realises he's never said it before. He'd thought he would be punished immediately for admitting the crime.  
  
Abby takes a sip of her coffee. Casey checks his watch again. Eleven-thirty-three.  
  
"Is that why you got divorced?" Abby asks finally.  
  
Casey shakes his head. "Not really."  
  
She waits.  
  
He exhales deeply, rubs a hand over his face. "It's complicated."  
  
"Make it simple," she says, a little sharp.  
  
"I was. Not a very good husband." Please don't ask.  
  
She blinks, then nods. "Why?"  
  
Jesus. "Why?"  
  
"Why weren't you a good husband."  
  
"Other than the--"  
  
She smiles a little. "Yes."  
  
He shrugs. "I put my--my _needs--_ before anybody else's. I still do."  
  
"How?"  
  
"How?" He's tired of this, he doesn't want to do this, he's done with this. "What--this is supposed to make me feel better?"  
  
She shrugs. "Eventually."  
  
"It's not working for Dan."  
  
"I can't discuss that," she says, eyes reproachful.  
  
"Ah, yes. Ethics. You probably shouldn't be trying to analyse me either, you know. Considering."  
  
Nodding, Abby says, "You're right. But, for one thing, I don't do analysis. I do--"  
  
"Therapy."  
  
"Yes. And I'm not starting a therapeutic relationship with you."She picks up her cup and closes her eyes, takes a sip.  
  
"I wasn't aware we were starting any sort of relationship at all." He can't help sounding a little defensive.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
"I'm sorry," he said to Lisa.  
  
She shook her head. "You don't fucking get it," she said.  
  
He swallowed. "I. I do. I just—"  
  
"No," she spat. "No." She dragged her hands through her hair, he remembered two weeks after their engagement when her ring got snagged in the thickness. He'd cut a small jagged patch of hair from her head, tugged the ring from her swollen red finger. Listened while she told him how stupid it was to get a claw setting.  
  
"Look at this," she swung around, arms wide, she turned a full circle. Encompassing the house and everything in it. Charlie was napping upstairs. "Look at how I work for you."  
  
Half-darkened rooms, comfortable and warm, late October afternoon spilling through the living room windows like melted butter. She fed and clothed him because he couldn't do for himself, he'd known that all his life. He's simply incapable of it. His father told him this loudly on a regular basis, and his mother said it silently with her folded piles of underwear in his drawers, his lunches neatly packed into his second year of college.  
  
Lisa clenched her fists together and looked so incredibly ready to punch him that he steeled himself for the blow. It didn't come.  
  
"Look," she said, quietly. "I've given you a son," she said. "My body, my time, my life, and I work so hard to give you everything you deserve. These things you, for whatever reason, don't want to work for. These things you go _out of your way_ to make impossible."  
  
She shrugged, trembling, face confused and frustrated. "And I don't know, I don't know--what else I can do."  
  
Her hands, her arms dropped to her sides. The defeat in her eyes.  
  
Casey didn't know either. He knew, though, that she'd always only wanted the best for him, and that she always only tried to help him have the best. In whatever ways, all he did was make it harder for her, harder than he should have wanted to make it. Didn't he want what she was trying to give him?  
  
"I'm sorry," Casey said. He could barely hear himself. "Please," he said.  
  
She blinked at him, tearing up, and he turned his hands away from his body, palms out. "Tell me what to do," he said. "I don't know what to do."  
  
She nodded slowly and went upstairs. He didn't know what had happened, but that evening he was allowed to kiss her good night before retiring to the couch, and in the morning there was a cup of coffee for him on the counter.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
"Dana," Casey says after the two o'clock rundown on Wednesday, following her out of the conference room, into the lobby.  
  
"I'm too busy to even recognise your voice, Casey," she says, almost jogging ahead of him, picking up messages and a package from the receptionist before pushing through the glass doors into the newsroom.  
  
So he follows silently until they get to her office. She turns to close the door and starts when she realises he's still behind her. "Casey."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"What?"  
  
"I wanted to ask you something."  
  
She sighs and pushes her monitor cart closer to her couch, the package under her arm. "You don't need to whiten your teeth."  
  
"What?" Fucking Danny. "That's not what I wanted to ask you."  
  
"However, you do need a haircut."  
  
"I wanted to ask you if you--pardon me?"  
  
"If you're looking for aesthetic improvement suggestions, I'm suggesting that you get a haircut."  
  
Casey stands with his mouth open for a moment, watching her tear the padded envelope open and grin when it turns out to be her boxed set of the 2000 Olympic track and field DVDs. "I don't need a haircut, and I. Dana. I wanted to ask. I was wondering if you think--"  
  
"I have a date tomorrow," she says abruptly.  
  
"What?"  
  
"I thought that's what you wanted to talk to me about. Isn't that what you want to talk to me about?"  
  
These people. Whatever happened to verbal grammar? "Ah, no."  
  
"Well, he's very nice."  
  
"I'm sure he is, but that's not--"  
  
"His name is Tracy."  
  
"Dana, you need to--Tracy?"  
  
She nods defensively. "Yes. Is there something wrong with that? Anything you'd like to harp on a little?"  
  
"Just that it's a--"  
  
"What do you want, Casey." She slaps a disc in the player.  
  
Perfectly willing to let it go, he thinks. Totally and completely willing. He's not even going to bug her about it later. Well. Maybe a little bit. "Do you think I'm repressed? Emotionally repressed?" he asks.  
  
And he licks his lip as she laughs, the Olympic hymn starting up behind her. Hair in her eyes, teeth glinting, arms crossed over her stomach. She bends over, stomping a heel against the carpet.  
  
"Jesus, Dana."  
  
She collapses onto her couch, still shaking, face a slightly garish shade of pink. She clears her throat, says, "Oh, Casey. Of course you're not repressed," with a relatively straight face.  
  
Which is, really, all the answer he needs. "Thank you."  
  
He can hear her giggling as he leaves. "You're welcome," she calls.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
The strike was over. Lisa carefully placed a card beside his bowl of granola at breakfast.  
  
"What's this?" he asked. She sat down and wiped oatmeal from Charlie's face before answering.  
  
"Mediation," she said.  
  
"Mediation?"  
  
"I guess." She hmmed. "Counselling, but mediation is a better word, don't you think? More indicative of what we need."  
  
"Counselling?"  
  
Charlie said, "Mommy likes lenomade. Dan likes lenomade. I like lenomade!"  
  
Casey smiled. "Everybody likes lemonade, Charlie. It's good stuff."  
  
"Do you like lenomade, Dad?" Charlie asked, scooping more oatmeal onto his chin.  
  
Lisa rolled her eyes and tried not to smile as she wiped Charlie clean again. "Charlie, Dad and I are talking, please don't interrupt. Just read the card, Casey."  
  
Sure enough, it said "Fuller Counselling  & Mediation: Specializing in Couples and Parent-Child Trauma." Trauma. Trauma?  
  
"Trauma?"  
  
"I have a green truck on my shirt," Charlie said.  
  
"Indeed you do," Casey said, and he leaned across the table to poke at the grinning green dump truck. He wiggled his finger under Charlie's arm. "It's a happy truck."  
  
Charlie giggled and pushed Casey's hand away. "Don't tickle, Dad."  
  
Casey frowned, that was the third time this morning he'd been Dad. "Dad?"  
  
Lisa put her coffee down and shrugged. "He's calling you Dad now."  
  
"I don't know if I like that."  
  
"Not much you can do about it."  
  
True. Charlie was four, fully capable of deciding that Casey was Dad and no longer Daddy. "Okay."  
  
"The trauma is parent-child trauma," Lisa said. "What we need is couples' mediation."  
  
Charlie started sucking lukewarm oatmeal off his spoon like a lollipop. Casey nodded. "Okay."  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
They've got four editing suites now, two with sound equipment in them as well, and Casey hates them all. They are harshly-lit, too cramped for couches, and actually soundproof so he has to knock on the damn door before he can talk to anybody. In Edit Bay C, he's looming over Danny and Jeremy while they try to cut this week's "We Can't Believe It's Sports" feature: soccer's nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize.  
  
Danny shakes his head and pushes away from the editing machine. "I'm out of here," he says.  
  
Casey squeezes himself into the corner not occupied by a door or editing equipment. Casey doesn't even try to call him back. It's not worth it. Jeremy is, probably wisely, silent until the door closes. Then he sighs and looks over his shoulder at Casey.  
  
"Dana should stop giving him soccer," he says.  
  
Casey feels his mouth twist unpleasantly. _Danny should get over it_ \--it's a stupid assignment and it's just for fun, Dana's trying to cheer him up by pointing out the ludicrousness of the world in her own ludicrous way and it's been way too long since Danny would laugh about this but he used to and they miss him and he should get. Over. It.  
  
Casey can't say that. He sighs too. "Yeah."  
  
"So," Jeremy says, with this tone of his that means he's done with the topic, "Lars Gustafsson, a Swedish lawmaker, has nominated soccer for the Nobel Peace Prize."  
  
"He's a lunatic and this isn't sports," Casey says, echoing Danny's opening statement in the argument over soccer's validity as a nominee.  
  
"Yes, but are we sure it's spelled with two s's?"  
  
Casey makes himself laugh and sits in Danny's vacated chair. "Soccer or Gustafsson?"  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
He sat beside Lisa on the couch in the sand-coloured office, the walls the same pale bland creamy brown as Danny's ancient Chrysler.  
  
"You feel you are unable to receive what you deserve, Casey," Alan said. "And you blame Lisa for that, even though she's trying to help you achieve your ambitions."  
  
Lisa nodded. Casey tried not to react, but his hand tightened on the armrest. There was a wide green-washed watercolour painting behind Alan's head, it reminded Casey of Dana's tattoo and the way she talked about the Pacific ocean receding, blurring into the sky on hazy days.  
  
"You have security issues," Alan said. "Stemming from the difficult relationship you have with your father, and when Lisa tries to help you feel better about yourself--by encouraging you to take that job in New York, for example--you lash out at her. You feel like she's invalidating your experience and trying to control you, which is something your father never allowed your mother to do."  
  
He heard Lisa sniff, she whispered, "Exactly," and he stared at the steel watch on Alan's wrist, watching the seconds tick past.  
  
  
  
 _Abby._  
  
"So you cheated on your wife, but that's not why you got divorced."  
  
"Right."  
  
"Does Dan know?"  
  
Casey blinks. "What? That I'm divorced?"  
  
Abby rolls her eyes. Again. "Does Dan know you cheated on Lisa."  
  
God no. The look on his face-- "No." Telling her it's final with the tone of his voice.  
  
She obviously cannot take a hint. "Why not?"  
  
"I--"  
  
"Why haven't you told him? He tells you everything, doesn't he?"  
  
"I tell you, it really feels like it some days."  
  
She smirks and it's possible she's the one person in the world who might feel more like that than he does.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
Three weeks after Danny's twenty-seventh birthday, Dana got a call from a gentleman in New York. "Isaac Jaffe," she said in the production booth after the Tuesday night show. "He's working for CSC, and they're looking for an experienced pair of anchor/writers and a producer for an eleven o'clock show."  
  
"Danny and I are experienced," Casey said. "You're experienced."  
  
"Yes," Dana said.  
  
"They want us."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"I'll talk to Lisa," Casey said.  
  
"What about Danny?"  
  
"I'll talk to him, too."  
  
"Casey. I want this," she said, leaning toward him over the control panel. "I want us to do this very badly."  
  
Casey tried to smile. "I'd think you'd want us to do this very well, Dana." She smirked and looked ready to smack him, so he added, "I want this, too. And Danny's going to want this once I talk to him. Don't worry about it."  
  
Lisa hugged him tightly and whispered, "Finally," in his ear, and she said CSC was third-place so he wouldn't have to work very hard, but maybe Fox would pick him up or something, and they'd be in New York so exposure would be easy as hell. She said on the new show he should try not to do so much stuff with Danny. She said making a clear distinction between them would encourage solo offers.  
  
"He's my partner, Lisa," he said.  
  
She sighed, long-suffering, twelve years of suffering, and said, "Let's face it, Casey. ESPN's never going to come knocking on Dan Rydell's door, and they're certainly not going to come within fifty feet of you if you're shooting promos with him."  
  
Casey knew she was right, but it wasn't right to say it out loud. So he took a six-pack to Danny's house as an apology.  
  
"What the hell?" Danny said when he opened the door. "Is it our anniversary or something?"  
  
"Nope." Casey smiled.  
  
They settled on the couch, Spurs/Nuggets, and during an interminable Kodak commercial Casey told Danny about the CSC offer.  
  
"Both of us?" Danny asked, sounding surprised.  
  
"Yeah. Why wouldn't they want both of us?"  
  
Danny's mouth quirked and he waved a hand dismissively. "Dana and us."  
  
"Dana and you and me."  
  
"That, too."  
  
"What do you think?"  
  
The game resumed and Danny hushed him. When there was a time-out ten seconds later he turned to Casey. "I'll tell you, Casey, I wouldn't mind working in New York. I love New York."  
  
"I know."  
  
"New York's got great stuff. The Yankees," Danny said, counting fingers around his beer bottle, "Central Park, the Metropolitan Opera. Great stuff."  
  
"So I've heard."  
  
"Madison Square Garden," he added, still counting. "And I think Dana would really enjoy working on a national show. I know I would."  
  
"I would too." Casey nodded, watching Danny's fingers curl around the brown glass again.  
  
"I know you would," Danny said, tilting the bottle in Casey's direction. Danny took a drink, watching the television, then added, face carefully blank, "I think Lisa would really enjoy being married to somebody who works on a national show."  
  
Casey took a second before saying, "I know she would," very quietly.  
  
Still with the solemn face, Danny said, "I think the clean air and the clear blue waters of the Hudson would be good for Charlie, not to mention the exceptional public education system."  
  
And there Casey couldn't help but laugh. "You really think so?" He watched Danny watching the screen, waiting for meaningful movement. His face so intent, body drawn compactly into the corner of the couch. A hand at his mouth, nails ready for chewing. Casey wanted to see him in New York.  
  
Danny nodded seriously, gaze not leaving the television. "I really do."  
  
The game started once more and Danny swore at the ref; as far as Casey could tell it was just for the hell of it. Casey felt solid inside, settled.  
  
In the spring they will move to New York.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
"So," Danny says after the two o'clock rundown. "How'd it go with Dr. Nora?"  
  
Casey doesn't look up from the LPGA Mizuno Classic update. He makes a mark beside Kirsten Kaine's sixty-five and crosses out Grace Park's sixty-eight. Dana's going to be giving him an crisp fifty dollar bill in the morning. "It didn't."  
  
"What happened?"  
  
"I cancelled."  
  
Danny sits back in his chair, eyes working along the full bookshelves. He says, "Tell me it's not because of what I said."  
  
Automatically, "It's not because of what you said."  
  
It's not. He didn't do it because of that. He did it because. He doesn't need therapy. He's fine. He doesn't have 'stuff', he's very firmly decided what baggage is relevant to his life and what isn't, he doesn't need anybody to talk to. He has people with whom he can talk, and when they're the ones he needs to talk about he has--he doesn't need therapy.  
  
"Then why?" Danny says.  
  
He shrugs, and he feels strangely angry. Why can't Danny just let things go? "I figure we're all stocked up on crazy around here, right, Danny?" There is a remark about soccer on the tip of his tongue, but he can already feel Danny freeze up across the office.  
  
It's a few seconds before Danny says, "Yeah. Right," and gets up. He leaves, clipboard and some binders under his arm.  
  
"--tape," Casey hears him mutter as the door closes.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
Dark eyes glittering at him over the bank of taps at the bar. He smiled at her and checked the doorway for Danny once more.  
  
When he looked back over, the glittering eyes were right beside him. "Just abandoned you, eh?" the girl said, her index and middle fingers splitting around the stem of her glass. Ruby nail polish. Lisa uses clear. Lisa's hair does not fall heavy and full and _dark_ across her shoulders--  
  
"He went to get his date a cab," he said. Annoyingly short blond from accounting. Where does Danny get these girls?  
  
"Uh huh," the girl said. Her smile grew from one corner to the other, lop-sided and lushly dark red. Even her lips glittered, and her teeth between them. "Would you get me a cab if I asked nicely?"  
  
You're not my date--"How nicely?"--where the hell did that come from--he doesn't flirt, doesn't know how--doesn't _matter_ , he's _married_ \--  
  
Her lips pursed a little bit in the middle of her smile and he couldn't help picturing them naked and pressed to his chest, then lower. She leaned closer, so close she blurred and he couldn't meet her eyes anymore, had to look away, up at the TV over the bar, catch his breath. Coolness of her inhale against his ear--  
  
"Please," she sighed, with warm air all through it right into his ear, right across his neck. He didn't shiver. He felt his spine melt into her voice. He felt a smile on his face that he hadn't felt in--ever, maybe, certainly not this predatory version. He felt her lean back and he saw her matching smile. He took a deep breath.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
On Friday Dana gives him the weekly compilation of feedback memos. "If you don't read them this time, something bad will happen," she says.  
  
"I'm shaking, Dana. Seriously." He tosses the stapled pages on his desk.  
  
Dana looks around the small office a few times, turning in a circle. "Where's Dan?"  
  
"You got notes for him, too?"  
  
"They're not notes," she says, exasperated. "They're--"  
  
"Feedback memos, I know," he says. "Dan's not here."  
  
"I can _see_ that, Casey. I have a fully-functioning pair of _eyes_. Where is he?"  
  
Casey shrugs. "Tape, probably."  
  
Her eyebrows draw together and her mouth goes worried so he turns away, picking up his notes--memos. Dana hmms. "He's in tape a lot the last few days," she says.  
  
"Yes."  
  
"You talked to him, right?" she says. "About how things are really good?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"And yet he's still--"  
  
"Yeah. Dana, he's a grown man." And I can't do anything for him anyway just leave me alone. "We can't control his psyche or his mental health or whatever, and frankly I think it pisses him off when we try."  
  
Her mouth goes angry, and she says, "Frankly, Casey, I think we should be trying everything we can in order to avoid not only the on-air fuck-ups of your last breakdown, but the deep morass in staff morale created by your last breakdown."  
  
Wait a minute. " _My_ last breakdown?"  
  
"Yours. Yours and Dan's. The two of you. Plural," she spits.  
  
"That wasn't my fault," he begins--  
  
"Shut _up_ ," Dana says, cutting her hand through the air between them.. "You guys are partners and we're counting on you and you can't just--" she swallows hard; he can see her crying in the ladies' room in five minutes "--Casey, I know avoidance and repression and God only knows what other stupid things have worked for you two idiots in the past twelve years, but for the good of the show and the good of _me_ , you've got to try something else."  
  
Her hand, fingers curled, shakes up and down twice. She clutches it to her chest, against her clipboard, and says, "Please."  
  
The office door opens on Dana's choked breathing and Casey's stunned silence.  
  
"I'm done with the Pro Bowl preview," Danny says calmly, pointing a tape in Dana's direction. "And I refrained from calling it a sordid exercise in football-themed idolatry, as per your request."  
  
Dana's laugh is thick and hitched, she can't quite pull it off. She takes the tape. "Thanks, Dan," she says.  
  
Danny steps inside so she can get out of the office. She says, "I'll see you at the, um, I'll see you guys later."  
  
Danny closes the door and looks at Casey; Casey knows what he's going to ask so he says, "Feedback," to head off the question. He gestures with the sheaf of papers, and sits at his desk.  
  
"Did she threaten you?" Danny asks, turning another tape over and over in his hands.  
  
"Yeah," Casey mutters.  
  
"Any notes for me?"  
  
"Feeback memos."  
  
"Still."  
  
"No."  
  
"Good."  
  
And Danny leaves again. Casey blinks a few times, then starts reading Dana's notes.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
The doorknob was cold, but the room key was warm in Casey's hand. The woman's fingers were hot in his other hand, and tucked in the waistband of his jeans, against his tailbone, burning dully.  
  
She tripped in the door way and kicked her stiletto heels off into the open bathroom. "Tools of the devil," she said.  
  
Her lips didn't glitter after she'd gone down on him and her eyes were glazed and dull after he'd gone down on her, and he knew--  
  
She clutched his hips as he tugged the condom on and pushed into her. Her nails scored him there, and at his shoulders, and her breath was sticky-hot in his ear--  
  
"Case--ey. Oh. My. God. Oh--"  
  
A syllable for every thrust it drove him crazy and gave him a headache, just made the burn in his balls hotter and finally finally she was shrieking--  
  
"--ey!"  
  
And he could finish.  
  
  
  
 _Abby._  
  
Abby suggests they meet outside the Quo Vadimus building and get hot dogs and take a walk.  
  
"This isn't a date," she says as she pays for both of them. "I'm just hungry and sometimes I like to get out of the office."  
  
"Okay," Casey says. He squirts mustard on his hot dog until the frank is entirely covered. He honestly hadn't thought about whether it might be a date or not--just lunch, and the coffee they had last week was just coffee. One more way he's different from Danny.  
  
They walk north on 27th and don't speak for a block or so. Casey is more interested in his food. Abby, he figures, is waiting for him to talk.  
  
He waits until she's done eating anyway. "Charlie asked for golf clubs for his birthday," he says. Abby tosses her napkin away and puts her hands in her jacket pockets.  
  
"Does that bother you?" she asks.  
  
"No."  
  
"So?"  
  
Even though he knows it's just professional, the curiosity in her voice is welcome and reassuring. A woman hasn't been curious about him since--a very long time.  
  
"So he doesn't seem to be interested in the sports I'm interested in, and that's okay," Casey says.  
  
Abby laughs. "That's very good."  
  
A few steps later, he says abruptly, "Here's the thing. I'm not going to tell Dan."  
  
A few steps after that, as they wait for the light to change at 5th, Abby says, "Why not?"  
  
Carefully prepared answer, airtight and defensible. "He doesn't need to know, and he's my best friend, and I don't want him to--"  
  
"You don't want him to think you're one of those guys. Like--what was his name?" she says, "Steve Cisco?"  
  
Steve Cisco, laughing and drinking and on the arm of any woman but his wife. Danny's complete and utter disgust, even before he was in love with Rebecca.  
  
"Dan doesn't cheat," Casey says quietly. "He hates it."  
  
Abby stops walking and touches his arm, holds it as he keeps walking, so he pauses right there at 27th and Broadway. Her eyes are like blue flannel. "I bet Dan's done a lot of things he doesn't want you to know about--things he thinks would cost him your friendship, or at least make you hate him if you knew. I bet there's things you do know about him that he's sure will make you give him up someday when you realise just how bad those things are in his eyes."  
  
Casey blinks. "Really?"  
  
As if she would actually answer that. "None of your business unless he makes it so, Casey. It's a common feeling. Everybody has it."  
  
"There's nothing Dan would do--"  
  
"But you don't know for sure what Dan would or would not do, Casey, and he doesn't know the same about you--that's the point."  
  
Casey nods. The problem of other minds. She takes her hand away and they turn up Broadway.  
  
"So should I tell him I slept with you too?" he asks. When he's said it, he realises it could be spiteful, but Abby laughs again.  
  
  
  
 _Dallas._  
  
Lisa sighed and handed him the aspirin and an empty water glass. "When you're done with that, please shave and take a shower. We have to meet the real estate agent at four."  
  
"Agent what?" Casey asked, slumping against the counter beside the sink.  
  
"Real. Estate. Agent," Lisa said. "About the house. And finding one in New York."  
  
He dragged himself around, knocking the glass on the tap before getting it centered. "It's going to be at least six months before we're there, Lise." The sound of water hitting the glass made him wince.  
  
"Planning ahead is always good idea, right?"  
  
He nodded, drinking his water. Still tasted her, heavy like leather at the back of his mouth.  
  
"I hope you had a good time," Lisa said sarcastically. She sat back down at the table and resumed the crossword puzzle. "I would've thought a thirty-two year old man could call his wife and tell her he's going to be out drinking all night. With his single friend." She paused, her pen working what looked like a particularly long answer across the paper. "You know, Case, it's honestly baffling to me that you still, after all these years, despite reams of irrefutable evidence to the contrary, insist that Dan isn't an irresponsible, selfish--"  
  
Struggling with the childproof cap on the aspirin bottle, Casey knocked the glass from the counter. It hit the floor and shattered. He felt tiny pinpricks, and water spilling over his foot.  
  
"Christ," Lisa said sharply. "Don't just stand there, get a towel."  
  
Casey took the closest towel-like thing he could see, the embroidered one hanging from the oven door. He dropped it on the puddle, watching it settle over the hard points of broken glass, turn dark with water.  
  
"Casey!" Lisa shouted. "Not a _tea_ towel, for God's sake!" She shoved him out of the way and grabbed it from the floor. She took the roll of paper towel from the counter and held it in front of him. "Paper towel," she said slowly.  
  
She fell to her knees. She dammed the puddle with bunches of paper towel and started picking the glass out.  
  
Casey stood above her, his headache fading down the back of his neck, settling in his stomach. He swallowed hard, watching the pale trickle of blood down the side of his foot.  
  
  
  
 _New York._  
  
After the Tuesday night show, Danny says, "I need a drink." He's sitting on the couch, tying his shoes, and he looks up at Casey. "What about you?"  
  
Casey doesn't really know the right answer, but Danny is asking him, so he says, "Yeah. Let's go."  
  
They walk from the building to the Green, and Danny is talking. Talking fast, light, with the low smooth drawling humour that Casey almost always wishes he could duplicate.  
  
"Like, the jockey's hanging from the horse by his ankle, and the announcer says some shit about a lucky loss, and I wonder why do I even watch individual sports at all?"  
  
Casey laughs as they cross the street, as he shuffles sideways to avoid contact with other pedestrians. Danny bumps shoulders with an Asian man with thick dreadlocks, looks over at Casey, and smiles.  
  
He will not tell Danny. Danny still has the bed he bought when they moved to Dallas.  
  
Casey smiles back and smacks him on the back for good luck.  
  
At the bar Danny takes a stool near the far end of the bar and Casey sits right next to him.  
  
"I like individual sports," Casey says.  
  
"I know this," Danny says. The bartender stops in front of him, and Danny says, "Moosehead, and a Bud for my pale Midwestern friend here." They've never learned the bartender's name, and he doesn't seem to recognise them. At least, he doesn't seem to care whether or not he recognises them. And that, after the nearly stifling familial atmosphere of Anthony's, is good.  
  
There is a long silence between them, and all around there is the ancient, benevolent noise of drinking and sporting.  
  
Casey says finally, "I like the personal excellence. The absolute dependence on the self. Athlete against the world. One competitor against a whole team of other singular competitors facing the same odds."  
  
Danny snorts, grinning. "You and me against the world," he sings, inevitably off-key.  
  
"You against the world," Casey corrects as his beer lands in front of him. He lifts the bottle and Danny stops in the middle of his own automatic pull.  
  
"What?" Danny says.  
  
Casey shrugs, swallowing. "Those are the lyrics, yes, but that's not what I mean. The principle of individual sports is generally considered to be man versus man, but I think it's more of a man versus mankind sort of thing."  
  
"Yeah," Danny says, and finally drinks. "I thought you meant something else."  
  
Casey looks over at him, sees and feels their shoulders touching. "Well?" he says, after Danny stares at the bank of monitors above the bar for a few minutes.  
  
"What?"  
  
"What did you think I meant?" Casey says.  
  
Danny turns his bottle with his index fingers. "It doesn't matter."  
  
"It actually does," Casey says, and he knows that it does.  
  
The corner of Danny's mouth tucks into that smirk Casey's just realising he hates. He's never really had the chance to feel one way or another about it before, but it comes so often lately--in the last year. Not lately. For a year now, it's been a common thing to see this awful half-smile. It's been over a year. This isn't new, it is not a surprise, and when he really thinks about it, Casey will notice it's not just been well over a year, it's been a really really long time. He just hasn't thought about it yet.  
  
"I thought," Danny says slowly, "that you meant you, as in me. Not you, as in humanity."  
  
"Ah," Casey says. "That's not what I meant."  
  
"I know this," Danny says, and he smiles for real.

**Author's Note:**

> Infidelity tag notes: While in a monogamous relationship, Casey engages in "on-screen" flirting with a character other than his partner, "off-screen" kissing with the same character, and "on-screen" flirting and sex with a second character. There are several pre-canon scenes where Casey and Lisa (his partner) argue about his fidelity (among other topics). There are no disclosure scenes.
> 
> "Married people who don't like each other very much" tag notes: Casey and Lisa's marriage is never described as anything like happy in the canon, and I've admittedly not painted it very nicely here, but I tried to keep everybody human.


End file.
